Lee Rips Into Park in First Presidential Debate

On the morning after the first presidential debate, the buzz in South Korean political circles is all about the ultra-left candidate Lee Jung-hee, who doesn’t stand a shot at winning, using her opportunity to be on stage with the two main contenders to tear down the ruling party’s nominee Park Geun-hye.

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The United Progressive Party candidate Lee Jung-Hee, Democratic United Party (DUP) candidate Moon Jae-In and ruling Saenuri Party’s presidential candidate, Park Geun-Hye participate during a TV debate on December 4, 2012 in Seoul, South Korea.

Ms. Lee made plain her intentions, saying at one point during Monday night’s debate: “I’m running to make sure Ms. Park loses.”

She called Ms. Park the “Yushin princess,” referring to Ms. Park’s time as the country’s first lady after her mother was killed during an assassination attempt on her father, who was president of South Korea from 1961 to 1979. Yushin is the name given to the later portion of Park Chung-hee’s presidency, after he had re-written constitution to extend his reign.

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She added, “We need a female president, but we can’t have a queen.”

Beyond the name-calling, however, Ms. Lee did land some solid criticisms, including that Ms. Park received 600 million won, about $550,000 if measured by today’s exchange rate but worth more than that at the time, from President Chun Doo-hwan who took over after her father was assassinated in 1979.

Ms. Park appeared to grow weary of the attacks, even angry at one point. She announced she would return the money provided to her by Mr. Chun. That would be a sizable chunk of her reported net worth of $2 million.

But while presenting some entertainment and posing legitimate questions, Ms. Lee’s barbs may not have changed the main dynamic of the race.

Several recent polls show Ms. Park has built a lead outside of the margin of error. And the question heading into the debate was: could Moon Jae-in, the nominee from the Democratic United Party, do something to re-take the momentum that Ms. Park, from the New Frontier Party, has grabbed over the past week?

The answer: It seems he didn’t.

Mr. Moon has had a difficult road to the Blue House. First, he faced off against four other contenders in the DUP’s primary. Then, he had to contend with Ahn Cheol-soo, the millionaire professor who ran as an independent and stirred passion from political outsiders and young people before dropping out and offering tepid support to Mr. Moon.

And now, there’s Ms. Lee, who is likely to take some of his potential voters on the leftist fringe.

Mr. Moon and Ms. Park exchanged a few jabs, but Mr. Moon came off as inanimate compared to Ms. Lee. Perhaps anyone would have.